Just over 18000 candidates could only qualify for JEE Advanced this year; therefore, Government has to intervene to ensure admissions of students from SC/ST, OBC category for seats reserved under these categories, said Prakash Javadekar, Hon'ble Minister, Human Resource Development during the question hour in Rajya Sabha. He also added that this year there is an improvement in the percentage of girl students securing admissions at IIT from 9.15% to 15.29% with 840 additional girl candidates.

Moreover, he said, IIT system reviewed the matter and issued an extended merit list of 31,988 qualified candidates and therefore, 11,961 seats were filled this year as compared to 10,876 filled last year.

He said, courses like agricultural engineering and biochemical engineering were not occupied due to less demand and therefore, only 118 seats were not filled, which he said is a concern and this will be discussed with IIT Council.

On a question raised regarding seats at IITs, Mr Javadekar said, ‘oversupply of seats in engineering colleges was a legacy issue earlier as AICTE would give approvals to start a college to almost anyone. However, he said that the states now have been asked to give a perspective plan for this and many states responded positively for this.

In conclusion, Mr Javadekar said that considering many serious issues like suicide cases, all the institutes have been asked to take steps like counselling, support mechanism and mentoring of students to stop these unfortunate events. Moreover, 15 such proactive measures have been suggested for consideration, said the HRD Minister.